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We’ve looked at 193 items in our global literature review focused on quality provision for babies (children aged 0-2 years old). We wanted to explore how quality is understood, measured, and supported across the world so we could learn from the practice already in place and apply that in England. 30 countries were represented in the review, but the research predominantly came from the USA (52 items) and Australia (36 items). The UK contributed just a few articles (12 items).

Australia contributes a great deal to how we understand quality by:

• Challenging common understandings of quality by championing the agency of babies and how exploring educators can attune to babies’ expressions and interests, follow babies’ innate explorations and curiosity, and have ethical, ‘response-able’ encounters with babies. (Cheeseman, 2017; Cheeseman, Press, and Sumsion, 2015).
• Looking at what quality means through the lens of language development by exploring how to engage in quality language encounters with infants (Degotardi, Torr, and Han 2018; Degotardi and Han, 2020).
• Offering new quality measures such as ORICL (Observe, Reflect, Improve Children’s Learning) which aims to build capacity in educators by helping them observe and reflect on their practice with children under the age of 3 years old with the aim of increasing the quality of individual children’s experiences in the classroom (Williams et al., 2023; Elwick et al., 2023).

The USA contributes widely regarded quality measures such as the ITERS and CLASS-Toddler. The ITERS and CLASS-Toddler are focused on observing and measuring process quality in settings. They have been found to be reliable and valid, making them popular around the world. However, there are still drawbacks to applying this tool outside of the US:

• The case of South Africa: In the research of Biersteker et al. (2016), parts of the ITERS were inappropriate for the realities of ECEC in South Africa. For example, the ITERS places an emphasis on free play in a resource rich environment, but resource rich environments are not always common in South Africa. Moreover, the tool did not address important parts of South African ECEC such as multilingualism and linking centre provision to health and social services.
• The case of the Netherlands: In the research of Bjornestad and Os (2018), the ITERS had to be adjusted to align with Norwegian values such as an emphasis on being outdoors, rain or shine, and appreciating nature. In spite of these adjustments, when the researchers finished the study, they found low quality scores across the board, pointing to potential cultural biases in the quality measures. In both of these cases, when the measures do not match localized understandings of quality, it can impact the outcomes of quality evaluations and also fail to offer meaningful areas of potential change.

What does this mean for England?

• We should reflect on what is applicable from global understandings and measurements of quality to our context, considering that societal values around the purpose of childcare shapes understandings of quality and how quality provision for babies is delivered.
• We should think about how we apply the knowledge gleaned from the global research. For example, while Australia offers several articles that fit within our age bracket of 0-2 years old, the US literature tends to consider children up to 3 years old, meaning that some ideas may not quite fit within an English context.
• This leads into the final point: England has a big opportunity to contribute in a robust way to the international research on quality for babies. As we have contributed a small amount on this topic thus far, we hope that this project highlights the importance of getting involved in this conversation.

We’d like to acknowledge that a limitation of our global literature review is that the search was done in English, therefore leaving out anything written in another language. This is a known problem in academic research (Bahji et al., 2023), but given the highly contextual nature of quality in the baby room, it is particularly relevant here.

Over to you!

• What is important to include in a UK-specific vision of quality for babies?
• What elements of quality from other countries should we apply to our own?

References

Bahji, A. et al. (2023) ‘Exclusion of the non-English-speaking world from the scientific literature: Recommendations for change for addiction journals and publishers’, Nordisk alkohol- & narkotikatidskrift : NAT, 40(1), pp. 6–13. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/14550725221102227.

Biersteker, L. et al. (2016) ‘Center-based early childhood care and education program quality: A South African study’, Early childhood research quarterly, 36, pp. 334–344. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2016.01.004.

Bjørnestad, E. and Os, E. (2018) ‘Quality in Norwegian childcare for toddlers using ITERS-R’, European early childhood education research journal, 26(1), pp. 111–127. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/1350293X.2018.1412051.

Cheeseman, S. (2017) ‘Narratives of infants’ encounters with curriculum: Beyond the curriculum of care’, Contemporary issues in early childhood, 18(1), pp. 55–66. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1463949117692243.

Cheeseman, S., Press, F. and Sumsion, J. (2015) ‘An encounter with “sayings” of curriculum: Levinas and the formalisation of infants’ learning’, Educational philosophy and theory, 47(8), pp. 822–832. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/00131857.2014.940825.

Degotardi, S. and Han, F. (2020) ‘Quality of educator-infant conversational interactions among infants experiencing varying quantity of linguistic input’, European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, 28(5), pp. 743–757. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/1350293X.2020.1817245.

Degotardi, S., Torr, J. and Han, F. (2018) ‘Infant Educators’ Use of Pedagogical Questioning: Relationships With the Context of Interaction and Educators’ Qualifications’, Early education and development, 29(8), pp. 1004–1018. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2018.1499000.

Elwick, S. et al. (2023) ‘Feasibility and potential benefits of the Observe, Reflect, Improve Children’s Learning (ORICL) tool: Perspectives of infant-toddler educators’, Australasian journal of early childhood, 48(3), pp. 203–216. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/18369391231186169.

Williams, K.E. et al. (2023) ‘Feasibility and initial psychometric properties of the observe, reflect, improve children’s learning tool (ORICL) for early childhood services: A tool for building capacity in infant and toddler educators’, Australasian journal of early childhood [Preprint]. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/18369391231194374.